A new survey of senior information technology executives at some of the nation’s largest health systems reveals that their top priority for IT infrastructure investment is analytics – a technology that is central to achieving the systematic quality improvements and cost reductions required by healthcare reform.

Health Catalyst surveyed members of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME), all chief information officers (CIOs) or other senior IT executives of US healthcare organizations. Survey respondents provided a high-level view of the many competing priorities for IT investment that hospital leaders face in the era of “value-based care” – a term describing elements of the Affordable Care Act as well as private industry incentives that reward providers for improving their patients’ health.

Most experts agree that value-based care will require hospitals to use sophisticated analytics to comb through terabytes of clinical and financial data to reveal actionable opportunities for improving quality and efficiency. The survey’s findings confirm that view, with 54 percent of respondents rating analytics as their highest IT priority, followed by investments in population health initiatives (42 percent), ICD-10 (30 percent), accountable care/shared risk initiatives (29 percent), and consolidation-related investments (11 percent).